Automation: The Future of BPO Industry

If you haven’t heard it, automation is said to threaten the future of BPO industry all over the world. Especially those positions that belonged to the lower-skills category. Indeed, the expected existence of automation and Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the industry could cause a major impact to employees, which in turn, could result to a variety of job loss with those in the affected sector.

To further explain the challenge that is to come in the industry. Here’s a breakdown of the future between automation, AI, and the BPO industry.

The BPO Industry at Present

BPO (or Business Process Outsourcing) is the business of outsourcing basic-medium business activities to a third-party provider. Generally, companies outsource to efficiently save costs and focus further on specific, more important tasks. Some of the services that the BPO industry provides include: customer service, data transcription, workflow processes, IT support services, financial services, and many others.

The Philippines is currently housing a lot of BPO companies. Among them are high earners Accenture, Convergys, JPMorgan Chase, Sykes, Telus, TeleTech, Sitel, Sutherland, SPi CRM, and Piton Global. We can’t also deny the fact that there are a lot of well-spoken English Filipinos. Hence, the progress of the industry in the region.

Why Automation and Artificial Intelligence is Being Considered as a Threat?

With the news making rounds over the Web. It’s a wonder why automation and AI is being considered a threat rather than the future of BPO industry.

Automation and AI is an innovation in the technology being used in the BPO industry. While we may have considered technology as a machine that needs users to make it work. It seems that the latest innovation says otherwise.

According to CNN Philippines’ report, AI is more than just a new technology. It helps processes proceed faster than with human intervention. However, it is a threat to employees who are working on jobs that belong to the lower-skill category, of which include the call centers. AI is capable of diminishing 45-50% of around 1.2 million employees on the Philippine BPO industry. This is said by the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) on this report.

How Can We Turn This Scenario to every Employee’s Advantage?

Aside from the reduction in services that BPOs may offer upon integration of automated services through AIs. The loss of jobs that may occur upon companies’ restructure in operations could very much affect the lives of many Filipino employees. Indeed, the BPO industry has become the main source of employment around the region.

In order to take this turn of events to their advantage, CNN Philippines reported that curriculums towards engineering, computer science, data science, and AI application design should be improved in order to adjust the workforce’s skills for knowledge-based jobs. Through this, automation and AI will never be considered a threat for future of BPO Industry.

Technology is changing, so are industries that manifest its use and purpose to the society. While it may be true that these changes may harm the future of BPO industry such as call centers in the Philippines. But we can always choose to innovate and improve ourselves in order to keep up with the changes. After all, it is for the betterment and convenience of everyone in the future.